Entrepreneurship is essentially a framework which produces utilities to make our lives better. An entrepreneur runs his idea over and over till their start-up takes off. And the Entrepreneurship Cell at IIT Kanpur has always facilitated that. The E-Cell organised its annual entrepreneurship summit last weekend (26th to 28th August) and therein were observed impeccable entrepreneurial skills in students, presentations of innovative ideas, interactive discussions and insightful talks.

Innovative Competitions

As the summit had fashioned in weeks prior to its main event, nuances of an Indian entrepreneur, with his jargon full of jugaad euphemisms, were captured in all aspiring entrepreneurs, when they were waiting eagerly for their 20-minute elevator pitch or when they were putting questions to a panel. With a wide range of participants and attendees, more than 300 entrepreneurs participated in Upstart Biz and Upstart SoCha unconvention, the flagship business model competition in E-Summit. Stock the stock, a new event where contestants do virtual trading, was so flooded that four lecture halls, each with a capacity of more than 150, were overwhelmed.

Wide Array Of Successful Guests

Kipling famously wrote that we ought to treat triumph and defeat the same and in no other walk of life is it more honestly ingrained than entrepreneurship. E-Summit had many distinguished entrepreneurs talk to the students about their ventures, regardless of which had been successful and which had not. VG Siddhartha (Founder and CEO, CCD), Sanjeev Bikhchandani (CEO, naukri.com), Pramod Saxena (CEO, Oxigen Wallet) spoke about how their life mapped itself along entrepreneurial lines. Rajat Jain of Pad Up ventures, a tech incubator, former managing director of Xerox India, Abhijeet Bhandari, alumni of IIT Kanpur, and Adhiraj Banerjee of Ivy camp were invited for a panel discussion, which was wonderfully moderated by Ravi Ranjan from 10,000 Startups.

This year, E-Summit experienced a ten-fold increase in its number of participants, and as competitions such as Social Pilot were introduced, it garnered more support and public attention. Workshops were held on ethical hacking, design thinking, android app development, legal aspects of start-ups and others.

Super Interactions With Industry Super Powers

CXO evening had diverse topics of discussion. Samar Singla, founder of Jugnoo, sold the idea that selling is entrepreneurship’s stepping stone and there’s arbitrage to be exploited in every corner. Alok Soni of your story debunked myths surrounding entrepreneurs. Nikhil Pahwa recounted his days of struggle for net neutrality.

On the last day of E-Summit’16, talks on social entrepreneurship were held as part of Upstart SoCha unconvention. Chand Das, ex CEO of ITC Limited spoke about budding entrepreneurs creating a business which not only assures profitability but also has a huge social impact.Dhairya Pujara, Founder and CEO of Y-Centre and Aarti Wig, co-founder of Yunus Social Business India emphasized on Social entrepreneurship being a powerful tool, essential to create the India we want.

Saket Modi, Ethical Hacker and one of Forbes’ 30 under 30 and Sachin Naik were the entrepreneurial equivalent of pro-night shows. Modi performed a live hack of a phone for the audience of 500 and later Naik engaged them in a game. As the event came to a close, E-Summit reiterated to all participants, “get ready, steady…and start up!”

Sreshth is an enthusiast of all things pop culture. When he's not busy writing and ideating, he is either binge-watching, binge-drinking or binge-sleeping. He is also an accomplished quizzer and quizmaster.